Last week I went our new local hospital, which hasn't been open very long, to visit a sick friend. When I arrived I couldn't go into the ward because she already had two visitors, that is all that is allowed at any one time. The reason being that the hospital is infected with the MRSA superbug and C Difficile.

At the entrance to each ward there are mulitiple huge notices requesting that all visitors should sterilise their hands with the cream supplied from a dispenser on the wall next to the door before entering, and when they leave to prevent the spread of infection.

I had to wait about 20 mins for my turn to go in and during that time I saw numerous other visitors coming and going from the ward without even so much as a glance at the dispenser, in spite of the notices with big arrows pointing to the dispenser. I am not surpised that the infections continue to spread from hospital to hospital. Do the staff and doctors who have to visit other hospitals bother to sterilize there hands? I wonder.

It seems that every Tom, Dick and Harry thinks these rules apply to everyone else except them.

It's the same on the roads. The Highway code is just ignored by all except the more intelligent drivers, and there doesn't seem to be many of them about now! Everyone else again seems to think that they are above the law and the Highway Code applies to all the other road users except them.

Latest figures for 2005 from the Office for National Statistics show C Difficile was a factor in more than 3,800 deaths across the country while MRSA contributed to 1,629 deaths. Infections with MRSA are falling from a peak in 2003 but C Difficile cases are still on the rise.

Even in the mid-1800s, standards were better, they say. Nursing pioneer Florence Nightingale imposed basic hygiene standards, checking cleanliness every morning on the wards.

Only last night a friend remarked to me that no matter what illness he gets he would never go into hospital. He said that he would rather die at home or in the street rather than die in hospital of complications.

Surprise! Now then, I'm in charge of this blog until Sandy gets back, and just to make sure that everything is kept nice and tidy I don't want any nonsense from you lot. I will not tolerate any insubordination, unruly behaviour or spitting. You will form an orderly queue when making comments. Is that clear?

I must admit that this is a strange bloghost, I'm having a job to find my way around in the dark. I just hope I don't mess it all up otherwise I'm going to be the one to get a boll ..... er ... telling off!

By the time you're reading this Sandy and Bear will be on their way to Paris. It's not the sort of place that I would choose for a holiday because I don't think that Paris is really French any more. It's getting like London, a big cosmopolitan city with no heart. You can wander around London, or any other capital city now and feel very lonely. I much prefer somewhere small, like St Cere, a small town in the Dordogne. It's like stepping back twenty years. The people are friendly, you only have to sit in a bar on your own and soon people are talking to you; being nosey if you like. 

My own blogpage?  I'm  having a spot of bother at the moment, and trying to resolve a few bugs and other issues that have come to light since http://www.meonline.co.uk/ came online in June.

If you read the Bold Soul you willl see that some people are really well organised when they go away.

But not me.

This time on Thursday we should be on the train to Paris and I'm far from ready. I haven't even made a list of things to do or things to take. There is a pathetically small pile of 'clean and not to be worn till holiday' clothes on the shelf in the utility room and a few items for last minute shopping on the chalkboard in the kitchen - like catfood, cornflakes, toothpaste and shampoo. (The first two are to stay here by the way - just in case you thought we were taking the cats with us!)

Bear has not decided which cases he wants to take. I've suggested the two wheelie ones but he's not keen. Can't think why not. They're much more convenient.

Despite the fact that there's such a lot to do, my mind is a complete blank. I'm neither excited nor worried. There's a sort of quiet confidence - or maybe unwarranted optimism - that all will be ready on time.

As for the blog, I will be away until October 4th but don't go away.

Watch this space.

I don't know what it is about my son. He's a very good driver but he manages to attract accidents.

There was the time in Belgium when he went into the back of a car driven by a Japanese man who swerved in front of him to avoid another car which had skidded on the icey roads. Not Jay's fault but it caused a few paperwork problems with the insurance.

Then the old car was vandalised - not once but twice - in Amsterdam and the present car was broken into in London.

Today he was driving down our road when a car was backed out of its garage and hit him. The damage is not that bad. At least the car is drivable but it will probably need a new rear door and maybe wing as well.

Anyway, Jay came home to get me to go along as translator to fill in the accident report. The chap smelled a bit of alcohol but he was quite calm and kind of apologised. We filled in the details and ticked the boxes but had to cross one out - thanks to the chap's mistake.

Once home I realised that he had not filled in the complete registration number so we jumped in our car and went to see if he was still there - but he had gone.

He had also written down his wife's name as the driver.

Jay had to go into town so I walked to the local garage and had a word with Sylvain to warn him what was coming and pay for last week's service. We joked about one person's misfortune being lucky for others.

He said I'd have to get the full car number before sending in the form so I walked round to the house and found the man's wife in the garden. She was very pleasant and we chatted for quite a long time. Apparently she was very cross with him because it was her car and she should have been taking her daughter to a class this afternoon. However, he wanted to get the insurance and garage business dealt with immediately and had gone into town.

She said she would send him round to see us as soon as he got back. That would make it too late for us to catch the post so I rang in to report the accident.

I'm getting the hang of insurance claims (having had plenty of practice) and so was prepared for her to say our local garage was not 'agrée'. I insisted instead of giving in meekly this time and she backed down. She has arranged an appointment with the assessor on Wednesday morning.

We took the car to show Sylvain the damage and he rubbed his hands gleefully. Could be an expensive job then - but at least it's the other insurance that must pay so we should keep our No Claims Bonus. Fingers crossed.

It was Yaxlich who wrote about some of the search words that  led people to his blog and sometimes, out of interest, I look at the google results that bring visitors to click on my site (and then, more often than not,  go away immediately.)

Surprisingly, the words that crop up most regularly are 'yellow basilicon', followed closely by 'normacol'.

As far as I know, yellow basilicon is no longer available but during my childhood my gran and mum used it regularly to draw out offending splinters or even bits of glass. Splap on a good helping, cover with a plaster and leave overnight. It worked like magic.

You could still get it when my children were little and there was always a jar in my medicine cupboard. It's hard to say when it disappeared off the chemists' shelves - or why, for that matter - but I haven't seen any for years. Apparently other people miss it too.

'Normacol' searchers rarely stay to read about Whale's exploits. No doubt they just want straightforward medical data but I do wonder  why anyone would search for 'tetanus jab in bum'.

Today is Jay's birthday.

Unfortunately for him it has been a rather low-key affair, starting with a visit to the dermatologist. He scraped the offending verruca until it bled and then administered not one but two injections into the raw looking place. It made me go cold just watching. Jay managed not to flinch – too much.

We then met up with CC in town for a coffee but they both disappeared soon after because Bear was coming to meet me for lunch.

Jay had decided to celebrate his birthday properly next week when CC has finished her course of ABSOLUTELY NO ALCOHOL antibiotics but he was looking forward to opening his presents en famille accompanied by coffee and macaroons when I got back.

But Bear wanted to go shopping after lunch. First we went to a large D.I.Y. Store where he poked around not really knowing what he was after for ages.

He then decided to go elsewhere – namely the supermarket.

My heart sank. Bear loves browsing round Carrefour (or Cora or Auchan or any hypermarket) and so I knew this would not be a quick shop. Sure enough he fiddled about among the electrical and hardware aisles before deciding that what he wanted wasn't there but we'd “look for something for tea.”

He made a beeline for the cake counter and chose eclairs – just a pack of two for himself. He didn't like the last lot of ham I bought so we went to the meat counter for him to make his choice. Next in the trolley was catlitter and boxes of Whiskas on special offer and we eventually made it to the checkout. If I had told him I'd like to get back for Jay he would either have thrown a wobbly or employed delaying tactics (or maybe both) so I followed him patiently until he had finished.

Back home CC made coffee and we got together with the Whale in the study to watch the present unwrapping.while nibbling the macaroons. Bear stayed in the living room watching TV. I'm not sure whether or not he realised it was Jay's birthday but as there's a strong case of mutual indifference between the two of them it was better that way.

I was sad there was no birthday meal. Jay prepared his own salad and took it up to his room to watch his new DVD. CC and I made a vegetable stew which Whale reluctantly shared and Bear had a ham sandwich and his eclairs in front of the telly.

The real celebration is scheduled for next Tuesday.

It happens from time to time.

I open the door to find a dubious salesman or, occasionally a beggar.

Today it was a swarthy fellow clutching a carpet.

It was the usual sales patter:

"This is worth 200euros but I'm selling it today for 125."

"No thank you. We have a person in a wheelchair. Carpets are not practical. And, besides, I've overspent this month already"

His insistant banter made me crease up with laughter and I was amazed that he reduced the price gradually until he had reached 30 euros.

"But we have cats who will probably pee on it" was my last effort to say no.

In the end I called Bear to come to my assistance.

"Oh, it's a nice colour" he beamed. "Thirty euros? We'll get it if you like it."

The man didn't need to know any English to get the message. We couldn't wriggle out of it now without some unpleasantness.

Bear got out his wallet and drew out quite a few notes. He handed over two twenties and the man made for the door.

"I thought you said THIRTY" protested Bear. "If he doesn't give me my change he can have the carpet back."

Once again the chap got the message, handed over a battered 10 euro note and went off muttering.

"Where are we going to put it?" asked Bear when we brought the carpet through.

"I don't know." I replied. "Maybe we can put it in the living room in the Winter. Bare tiles can be a bit cold."

Some time later my neighbour called in.

"How much did you pay for the carpet?"

"Thirty."

"He offered it to us for twenty" she said.

Jay has had problems with a verucca for over a year now and has been going to a dermatologist who has tried various treatments.

The last attempt was with an injection  - or rather two - which he said should do the trick.

But it hasn't.

He is a very pleasant chap and invited us to go back to him if there was a problem. Unfortunately his secretaries are highly reluctant to let anyone get near him.

This morning I rang to explain the situation and ask if there was any hope of seeing the Doctor for a few minutes - or perhaps having a word.

No way. He was absolutely full up. The best she could do was  give us an appointment for October 16th.

 "That's rather a long time to wait, especially as he has a long drive to do."

"Your only chance is to see if your GP will get you an earlier appointment".

"Right, that's what I'll do." was my reply and we both wished each other 'Bonne journée' with cool politeness.

So I rang the surgery to find out when our doctor was free.

"She's on holiday. It will be Doctor L." said the receptionist. Hmm. We know the locum doctor quite well as it's always the same one but whether or not she'd want to argue our case with those secretaries was another matter. She's kind of too nice.

All the same, we were given a rendezvous at 3.45 and she listened to the problem and inspected the foot. She decided on two courses of action - one: a homeopathic remedy and two: phone the dermatologist.

First she typed out the prescription saying that she found there wasn't much in the way of allopathic medication for veruccas but the homeopathic approach was often successful - if long. She added that not all doctors approved (our GP doesn't) but she found it very useful.

Then she dialled the dermatologist and was most assertive but in a pleasant way. When she put the phone down she looked up and said with a satisfied smile,

"Ten o'clock tomorrow morning."

While we were waiting at the chemist's Jay wondered if we could get away with pretending to be a doctor next time we want an appointment.

Not with my accent I'm afraid.

Ever since the end of August my computer has been having problems staying connected.

The computer people have spent hours trying to sort it out and when they said they had found the cause - 'Windows wasn't managing the connection' - they took it away and started again from scratch.

A few minutes after they had set it all up again here, it went offline.

It has to be said that nine times out of ten it will work if you restart it but that doesn't make it any less annoying when it goes offline in the middle of something important. I've already lost a post that way. (And this one but I copied it before trying to save.)

I have come to the conclusion that there is no point in calling the French 'experts' back, so after searching the net (on Bear's computer) I came up with various pages of technical suggestions from Microsoft.

Two attempts at following instructions made it worse. Thank goodness I managed to reverse my actions.

In the end I emailed the 'microsoft support' and had a prompt reply giving me the helpline number in France. I replied that I needed help in English and that's why I had contacted them.

The reply - again prompt - informed me that American products were not the same as European ones. Oops. I thought I was communicating with England.

Next step was to track down the helpline in the UK. I phoned, pressed all the buttons when prompted and waited.

A lady with a pronounced Indian accent greeted me and I explained the problem.

"We can't help you if you bought the product in France" she insisted and wouldn't accept the fact that talking in French about computer problems would be extremely difficult.

"They will speak English at Microsoft in France" were her parting words.

So, I tried again. Fortunately the alternatives for button pressing were the same as the English helpline but when I'd finished there was a very long wait. Then I glance at my watch. It was ten past twelve. "Bet they're all having lunch" I muttered to myself.

Sure enough, when I tried a little after two o'clock there was a quick response from a friendly French chap. I asked if he spoke English.

"A leetle" he replied and we continued in a mixture of French and English with lots of repetition. But this was only to ascertain whether or not I was entitled to help and, if so, to produce a dossier.

The formalities over, he agreed that my Windows XP was genuine and said they were not used to dealing with English XP but would have a go.

I said I had tried the English helpline but they had refused to help. He was amazed.

"But we are all in Europe now."

Eventually he gave me a dossier number and asked me to hold while he put me through to the technical helpline.

A chap called Christophe answered. He didn't speak English either and there was a problem with the dossier number.

More music - and then a young lady came on the line. It seems I had misheard the number and written down an extra two figures.

Back to the technicians and a different chap. Who didn't speak English either.

We went through a few hoops but without success. He remained charming and patient throughout but it was painfully obvious that some computer terms are totally different in French and English.

At last, he gave up and said they did have one chap who spoke good English. The bad news was that he was off sick.

The good news is that he is due back tomorrow and should phone me in the morning.

As soon as I got my computer back online I wrote an email to the Microsoft UK support feedback manager to tell him what I thought of their UK helpline.

CC had a check-up in London just before she came over to stay for good. It was incredibly difficult to find an NHS dentist and they wouldn't take her on unless she took out  Denplan insurance. When she had a problem with inflamed and bleeding gums she was given a mouthwash which stained her teeth.

The same problem reared its ugly head again and so I made an appointment at our local surgery. She was given a form to fill in and a prescription for an x-ray but when they rang to ask if we could change the dental appointment to 8 o'clock this morning there was no time to arrange it.

CC is not at all nervous about seeing dentists: unlike her mum. As long as I can remember I have had a very strong aversion to any dentists' tools coming anywhere near my mouth and as soon as I was old enough to take a stand I would say "OK, you can look but you mustn't touch." 

How I ever put up with having a wisdom tooth out I'll never know but it was a bit loose anyway so it came out quite easily. The worst part was all the bleeding afterwards. Then there was the time when I bit the dentist's finger. . . .

Anyway, CC and I were greeted by the dentist at 8 sharp and we sat down to explain the problem. Then she invited CC to take the chair and began her examination.

To our surprise she took a swab to put under the microscope and called us over to have a look.

She pointed out tiny moving bacteria, just a few of them, darting across the screen.

"That's what's causing your trouble." she explained.

It seems that people who are not prone to decaying teeth often have a tendency to house these little beasties which cause bone 'loss' and consequent receding gums. The bacteria responsible for caries prevent these from reproducing.

What's more a tendency to nurture this kind of bacteria runs in families. Oh dear. My mum had very few problems with caries but she did have receding gums and, in the past, dentists have told me I had similar problems. But they didn't make any suggestions or do anything about it.

Not so with CC's new dentist. She has given her orders to use a special toothpaste which must never, under any circumstances be used in conjunction with any other toothpaste. Then she has a special pokey thing to push between all her teeth every night before rinsing with a mouthwash which matches the toothpaste.

"It will make your gums bleed for the first week or so but it will be alright after that."

Worst of all, she has a course of antibiotics for ten days. When we collected them from the chemist she said,

"Did the dentist warn you that it is absolutely forbidden to have any alcohol with these tablets? Not even other medicines containing alcohol."

Our faces fell. It is Jay's birthday next week and we were planning a celebratory meal - with champagne.